I See You
by aquariusyoi
Summary: Inspired by aluox on Tumblr. For as long as he could remember, Alfred could see ghosts. It wasn't really a gift - the ghosts looked how they died, gunshot wounds with pouring blood, charred black bodies, every kind of graphic gore imaginable. And he had to go to a haunted school. Yay.


Alfred was on the train, watching the scenery pass. It became more and more rural every second, the train whooshing past the greenery.

So far, he had survived the 19 years of his life and this was the first day of college.

Oh boy. College. Another small step in life, but a huge step for him.

As long as he could remember, he could see ghosts. And not those white-sheet ghosts - those were spirits, according to his older adoptive brother - ghosts that looked human.

Except, of course, they looked how they died. Stabbed in the heart (a classic in movies, but they weren't really common), gunshot wound to the head (America really was lax on those rules), broken necks with bruised lines (they had been increasing lately).

It scared the shit out of him when he realized that nobody else could see them. Like, he could stumble on a ghost that died peacefully, looking like a normal human, strike up a conversation with them, then either be called crazy or the ghost would get attached to him. Or both.

So far, the second option hadn't happened yet. And he fervently wished that it wouldn't.

Back to college. His adoptive brother, Arthur, had decided for him to go to the same college as his (full-blooded) other older brother.

Tugati College. In a castle on a hill, a mere hundred miles away from his town and in the suburbs.

Awesome. Wow. It was a really prestigious one at that too - just ignore the fact that there were rumours surrounding it, about how it was once used for torture and how many innocents (and not-so innocents) died in there. And of course, student suicide.

He wasn't really willing to test those rumours out himself. But Arthur was the oldest, so he just had to suck it up.

After all, it was just three years.

The sun beat down mercilessly, ignorant of the fact that it was supposed to be autumn.

Heat blasted in as soon as the carriage doors swung open. It was comparable to a summer's day, only hotter.

God, he wished that he could use that on a girl (or boy) one day.

He heaved his luggage out - a trunk, large laundry bag filled with clean clothes and a duffle bag - out.

Tugati College looked majestic, even more so than Hogwarts. Without the lake.

And what was this cold breeze in the stagnant, hot air - oh my! A ghost!

He turned his head away - out of sight, out of mind - and kept walking.

His dorms were the farthest away from the entrance - typical - and the college itself was built on a hill.

Joy. At least they had buggy service on the first day.

Just the first day.

He wasn't really expecting much from the dorm - college accommodation was notoriously bad - so he was surprised by the cleanliness of the dorm. But it could just be Matthew.

Of course, he would be in the same dorm as Matthew. The college had a strange unwritten rule - first years had to bunk with second years, and second bunked with first or third.

At least he wasn't roommates with a stranger.

Matt had pinned a note to the corkboard.

"Alfred, don't trash this place. Your bed's the one next to the window. Do not touch my stuff."

Well.

He had no idea, honest, why Matt would perceive him as someone who messes things up.

Really. It was just an accident that he tripped over his feet and knocked over the Jenga tower when he got up to get a glass of water, or when screamed (at a particularly bloody ghost, mind you) and waved his hands around, obliterating basically anything loose in an arm's radius.

He carefully picked his way towards the bed by the window.

Matt wasn't someone to fuck with.

Maybe he had a girlfriend? He should ask him later.

He seriously regretted taking History.

Professor Wang was an absolute slavedriver.

He liked history, of course, but sometimes it wasn't... exciting, per se.

Trying to finish the assignment on the history of Japan hours before it was due in the library without another soul wasn't exciting.

He gave up after ten minutes of attempting to bullshit a whole assignment while managing to pass.

"Argh! This is useless! I'm gonna fail this year!" he screeched, tugging on his hair in frustration.

"Fuck this shit... I give up," he muttered as he flopped lifelessly onto the table.

He heard a low chuckle beside him.

"Ehehehe... another victim of Professor Wang's perfectionism, huh?"

"Mmh... I hate him," he mumbled, head in his hands.

"Ehh? You can see me?" his tone was one of surprise.

Wait.

Alfred turned slowly.

And there he was, in all his glory, a platinum blonde with(out) an eye, grinning happily.

The other was just a bloody hole.

...Fuck. And he had done so well in not letting the school's ghosts notice him.

He freaked out, of course, since it was a little unnerving to meet a ghost in a library by yourself. But he recovered quickly and very discreetly retreated.

He definitely didn't knock over his chair, grab his books and laptop and run into the glass door as he ran out.

"You okay?" the ghost squatted beside him, looking completely innocent and childish with the happy face. If you didn't look at the gaping hole where his right eye was supposed to be or his blood-stained uniform.

Alfred got up, nearly falling over again.

"O-oh I'm fine. Just- get away from me."

He almost looked hurt.

"But- I've been so lonely! I can help you with your assignment too! I actually got a degree in History, you know."

He considered it once.

Oh who was he kidding. He instantly accepted the offer.

And in the days later, if you searched for them in the library, you would see them in a secluded corner, the ghost tutoring Alfred.

But you wouldn't see the ghost as you weren't Alfred, so you would see a first year talking to thin air and conclude that college stress had got to him.

Three years seemed to pass in the blink of an eye.

Alfred had been improving with the help of Ivan the Bloody One-Eyed Ghost Who He (Obviously) Didn't Have A Crush On.

Like, he wasn't into necrophilia or anything, just that Ivan was so sweet (but sometimes terrifying) and good in teaching. If you ignored the phantom blood that dripped onto the page.

Honestly, the only reason he passed with flying colours was Ivan.

The graduation ceremony took place on a windy autumn. As he walked on stage, his class (and Matt and Arthur) burst out in cheers.

He shed a few tears then and there.

Oh, how he had came to love and hate the campus, with all his friends, all the teachers, all the hills and all the ghosts.

This would be his last day in Tugati College.

So much to say goodbye too.

So much to leave behind.

He took the stairs two at a time, sprinting, wanting to see Ivan again, wanting to thank him.

The library was open as usual, but with less students as usual (i.e., none) - everybody was celebrating.

He pushed the huge doors open.

The librarian glanced up at him and went back to watching YouTube videos on her computer.

He made his way to their usual spot, the small table and two chairs hidden by bookshelves of books that nobody read. His footsteps echoed in the silence.

He wasn't there.

Alfred stared at the empty chairs.

Maybe he was hiding, wanting to scare him? It seemed like him.

He walked around the library, searching for Ivan in every nook and cranny. The librarian didn't give a fuck about this graduate walking back and forth the library. Maybe he was here just to reminisce.

He couldn't find Ivan anywhere.

The library was quiet, shrouded in a silence that seemed oppressive, pushing him down.

Maybe he was somewhere else...?

And oh did he search. Except for the girl's toilets and other "no entry" rooms, he went in every single room, searched every place, from the gutters to the click tower, from the engineering building to the psychology building.

Matthew and Arthur did ask him why he was frantically running around, but he brushed it off as him trying to imprint every single blade of grass in his brain. They didn't look as if they believed him, but they let him go.

And finally, when the sun set, yellow on orange on red, did he finally come to the conclusion that Ivan wasn't, in fact, on the school grounds.

And it broke his heart.

Ghosts could only haunt one place. For Ivan, it was the school, mostly the library.

He couldn't have left him, could he?

"Alfred? We have to go," Matthew patted his shoulder. They were sitting on a bench, Arthur sipping a Stardollars while (probably) reading an e-book, occasionally glancing worriedly up at Alfred, Matthew jiggling his knee and trying to play a tapping game with one hand, Alfred just staring off into the distance.

"...You're right."

"What happened? You look like you broke up with someone," Arthur quipped.

"Nah. Just... too attached."

"Huh. I never knew someone who got that attached to college."

"...Yeah. Let's go home, then."

It had been five years. Alfred was still the bachelor of his friend group. He didn't mind, though.

He had secured a position as History Professor in Tugati College.

He still went to the library every day, to the lonely table and two chairs and sat on them, taking out his textbooks and thumbing through them, imagining the childishly happy voice of Ivan explaining the passages, little red splatters that vanished as soon as they fell.

He knew he should move on. They just weren't meant to be, like alternate angles, separated by a line.

And sometimes, he would visit the grave of his childhood friend Davie that had been killed by a car running the red light.

He always brought forget-me-nots, the purplish-blue flowers Davie had loved.

So was it just a coincidence when a child with platinum blonde hair stuck a few sunflowers in the new grave (it had been there for just a month) beside him?

Was it just a coincidence that he looked eerily similar to Ivan Braginsky, the library ghost with just an eye that he pined after?

And was it just a coincidence that the child smiled at him like Ivan did?

And here's the bottom! Thank you for reading this oneshot.

This was inspired by aloux on Tumblr. Go support them!


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